John Levitt - Unleashed

“Out of town for a few days,” I told her. “Some conference of medieval history academics. He’s due back tomorrow.”

“You should call him.”

“I will,” Victor said. “But Timothy can take care of pretty much everything.”

Victor was obviously drained and mostly just wanted to be left alone, so I suggested to Campbell we get a bite to eat. We stopped in at Marnee Thai, a small Thai restaurant in the Richmond, one of my favorites. We chatted over ample portions of Pad Thai and Mi Krob, catching up since we hadn’t talked for a while. Campbell was in the loop and knew about the creature we’d been hunting, but she hadn’t understood just how dangerous it was.

“What if you just left it alone?” she asked. “Maybe it would go back to wherever it came from, or just settle down somewhere.”

“If only. It doesn’t seem to have any desire to leave. And it seems to have a tremendous hatred of Ifrits-why, I can’t say. Maybe because it’s a distorted version of the true thing. In any case, Jasmine’s Ifrit, Mercedes, came up missing a while ago. In the old days we would have just assumed she had abandoned her-it’s sad, but it does happen. But then last month came an attack on Peewee, that little Ifrit/ferret who hangs with Jim Marvin. Jim was there and managed to drive it off, but it was a close thing. Then other deadly attacks, but this time on humans-by the supposed mountain lion that had been in all the papers. So it’s become serious and Victor and I have been trying to hunt it down ever since.”

“It never ends, does it?” Campbell said.

“Apparently not.”

“You been seeing anyone lately?” she asked, changing the subject. I shook my head.

“After my last misadventure, I haven’t much felt like dating.”

“I can understand that,” she said.

I didn’t ask her the same question. What had happened to Montague was still too raw. When Campbell was ready to resume a seminormal life, whenever that might be, I was sure she’d let me know.

Lou was waiting patiently on the sidewalk when we left and accepted a spring roll with good grace. No peanut sauce, though. As we walked back toward where I had parked, a homeless guy detached himself from a doorway.

Lou took one look and started over to greet him, then stopped, then started again, then stopped again, as if he were a toy mechanical with a gear out of whack. It takes a lot to confuse an Ifrit, but I didn’t blame him. This guy had long wild hair and a huge beard plaited in dreadlocks. He also flickered as he walked. And I knew him, all too well.

“Spare a quarter for a cup of coffee?” he said.

“What, you’re living in the sixties now? Where are you going to find coffee for a quarter?”

“A buck, then,” he said, smiling through discolored yet surprisingly strong teeth. And not just strong. Sharp, too. “Who’s your lady friend?”

He wasn’t threatening in any way, but he did project an unsettling aura of suppressed violence, as if he were a bomb that could go off at any moment. A year ago Campbell would have instinctively pulled closer to me, but she’d been through a lot since then. She gazed levelly at him and then walked over and offered her hand.

“I’m Campbell,” she said.

He looked a bit taken aback, which amused me no end, but he put out his own hand and grasped hers. When he let go, he stepped back and considered her curiously.

“You’re a healer,” he said. “An important profession. I’m honored. My name is Rolf.” She inclined her head gravely in acknowledgment.

I stared at him in astonishment. I’d know him for almost a year, and the only name I ever had for him was Bridge Guy, since that was where I’d first met him, living under the span of the Bay Bridge. He’d never shown any inclination to give me his name, and I hadn’t been sure he even remembered what it was anymore. But he casually handed it over to Campbell like he’d met her at a party in the Mission.

I also wasn’t entirely sure just how human he still was. He’d been the one who called up that creature we’d been hunting-with a little help from me.

“I’ve been looking for you,” he said “You screwed up, I see.”

I nodded, unsurprised. “That goes without saying. But you’re going to have to be more specific.”

“That thing you’ve been hunting? You’re supposed to get it, not the other way around.” Once again, he seemed to know more about my life than I was comfortable with.

“Maybe things would have turned out different if we’d had some help. You didn’t seem that interested the last time we talked, remember?”

“True. I had other concerns at the time. But there’s something else. That’s why I was looking for you.”

“Oh?” He shot a questioning glance toward Campbell. “She knows,” I said. “I tell her everything.” Campbell mumbled something I couldn’t quite catch, but it sounded like “not everything.” Bridge Guy, or rather, Rolf, nodded.

“Well, the creature that ran off that night wasn’t the only thing that came out of the energy pool. And not the worst, either.” Rolf could always be relied on to bring good tidings.

“How encouraging. What other things?”

“That’s not entirely clear to me. But it’s troubling.” Rolf wasn’t troubled by much, so this was also not great news.

“Yes, I can see how it would be,” I said.

He smiled, showing teeth that were suddenly a lot sharper than they had been. One of the unsettling things about Rolf was that he didn’t keep any one persona for any length of time.

“You could be of some help with this. You do owe me, you know.”

That wasn’t how I saw things at all, but I let it pass. But not completely. If I just went along with what he said, he’d be sure to take advantage of it.

“You got something to trade?” I asked. It wasn’t that I needed anything, or even wanted anything, but bargaining was mandatory. That was the way Rolf operated. He smiled again, teeth sharper yet.

“Actually, I’m the one doing you a favor, but I’ll let it ride this time. Meet me tonight, over by the bridge, same place. Don’t be late.” He nodded politely at Campbell and turned and hobbled off, just another street person.

“What time?” I called after him, but he didn’t turn around.

“Charming fellow,” said Campbell as we watched him shuffle down the street. “What was that about?”

“No idea,” I said.

“Are you going?”

“I have to. He’s not the sort to show up on an idle whim.”

“You want some company?” I thought about it.

“Couldn’t hurt,” I said. “He can be very particular about who exactly has been invited, but I think he likes you.”

“Oh, wonderful,” she said. “At last, an admirer.”

BY NOW IT WAS GROWING LATE, SO WE WENT back to my place. I was still living in my in-law apartment in the Mission, converted many years ago from a garage. It was a lot nicer than that sounds-blond wood paneling throughout, a garden in the back, and a landlord upstairs who traveled a lot. It was a good thing he was seldom home. If he’d been there full-time, he would eventually have noticed some very strange happenings indeed.

A dog door provides Lou with the freedom to come and go as he pleases, and the warding around the house, designed mostly by Eli, keeps out most unwanted visitors, at least those of the magical sort. It doesn’t do much to keep away the occasional Jehovah’s Witness or Mormon missionary, though.

I made some coffee and we sat at the little kitchen table. Campbell knew the basics of how the fake Ifrit had come into existence, but now that we were going to the very spot where it had happened, she wanted details. I could tell her what had happened, and how, but not why. I still didn’t understand a lot about it.